Reel art [antikvár]

rowing up, we both recall being fascinated by the ] movie posters that hung in the lobbies of our hometown Bijoux. Week after week, those sheets of colossal artwork, punchy color, and urgent copy propelled us straight to the box office. Each of us had been Hollywood's patsy too often to believe that movies delivered half of what the posters promised; but did knowing that the humbug behind the curtain wasn't really the Wizard of Oz make him any less irresistible? To some, the curious mind-set sometimes referred to as the "collector mentality" may seem a subject fit for a psychology graduate student's doctoral thesis. But, quite simply both of us came to collect posters out of sheer delight in the magic and flim-flammery that are the movies. Our adventures in scouring the world to obtain sought-after posters could have made for one hell of a Hope and Crosby "road" picture. Down back alleys to dusty bookshops, up to Manhattan high-rises, picking our way through deserted theaters, warehouses, and desert outposts, furtive meetings at ungodly hours in airport lounges, or in parking garages a la Watergate—our paper chase involved them all. And more. These encounters brought us eyeball to eyeball with folks who could have coached Barry Fitzgerald or Jane Darwell in benevolence, and self-serving types who could have given Sydney Greenstreet or Richard WIdmark pointers on how to play major-league heels. Beyond pride of ownership, our collecting urge was motivated by one certainty: unless people began to preserve these wonderful artifacts and allow others to enjoy them, great posters—like many films—might vanish forever. Naturally, we jumped at the chance to stage a bang-up poster exhibition within the pages of a book, but other books had already accomplished that quite ably What we hoped most to do was to yank back Hollywood's curtain for a glimpse at how those other wizards—studio moguls, art directors, illustrators, and copywriters—practiced the art and